1. Technical Field
The disclosure relates to a sun visor for an automotive vehicle.
2. Background Art
Typical sun visors for automotive vehicles are fixed to the vehicle roof at one corner of the sun visor and selectably affixed to the vehicle roof at a second corner. The visor is selectably affixed by a pin attached to the visor which can be engaged into a mount permanently coupled to the vehicle roof. The mount has a hook portion into which the pin can be snapped. When the pin is snapped into the hook, the hook wraps around the pin more than half of the circumference of the pin. The hook spreads apart when a force is applied to the sun visor to disengage the pin or to engage the pin. The pin snaps back in place after the pin has moved past the opening in the hook. One of the problems with such a configuration is that the amount of effort to snap the pin in place or to release the pin depends on the manufacturing tolerance of the hook, the temperature of the hook, and the amount of wear on the hook. As the hook is often made of a polymeric material, the hook is more or less resilient depending on the temperature. At extremely cold temperatures, the amount of force necessary to disengage the pin from the hook is great. If too much force is required to disengage the pin and the hook is brittle due to low temperatures, it is possible to fracture the hook. Under high temperature conditions, the amount of force to disengage may be too little so that when a person is attempting to adjust the visor, e.g., rotate the visor between an in-use and a stowed position that the visor is pulled out of the hook. This can be an unwelcome surprise, particularly if the person is operating the vehicle. It is costly to manufacture the hook with the desired tolerances that ensures reasonable performance under the expected operating condition ranges.
The hook-and-pin type configuration presents an inconvenience to a person trying to disengage the pin because it can be disengaged in only one direction. Typically, the pin is disengaged by pulling on the visor in a direction away from the windshield, i.e., toward the person pulling on the visor. Because it disengages in only one direction, or a small range of angles, it can be difficult for the person trying to disengage the visor to be successful, unless looking at the visor while trying to disengage the visor, which may not be possible if the person is operating the vehicle. The problem is likely exacerbated for a person of short stature or one who adjusts their seat farther from the windshield.
One of the reasons to have one of the attachment points of the sun visor being disengageable is to provide flexibility in blocking out the sun both in front of the person and to the side of the person. The other reason to provide such flexibility is that under certain, unusual circumstances, objects may be accelerated within the vehicle and impact the sun visor. To reduce damage to such objects that may be contacting the sun visor and to avoid snapping off the hook of the sun visor due to the impact, it may be desirable for the sun visor to disengage toward the front. Thus, the hooks of future sun visor systems may have the opening to the hook facing toward the windshield so that in such unusual circumstances of high acceleration when an object from the cabin may be accelerated toward the windshield, the pin of the visor disengages to allow the visor to move freely. Although such configuration of the hook is desirable under such unusual circumstances, this configuration is even more difficult for a person to operate. In releasing the pin from the hook in a direction away from the cabin, the person is likely to smash the sun visor into the windshield, possibly lightly pinching a finger or rapping a knuckle on the windshield in the process. Furthermore, by requiring the sun visor to move away from the person to allow disengagement, it may preclude smaller persons from being able to disengage the sun visor unless they are unbelted and the car is not moving.
Yet another disadvantage is that if a clearance between the pin and the hook develops or if such a clearance exists upon manufacture, the pin can rattle in the hook leading to undesirable cabin noise. Or, if the hook is too tight, the pin may squeak in the hook.